59) "Behold your place in the universe of God"
Mauro died yesterday evening. I’d been visiting him over recent weeks and reporting back to his daughter in Queensland. She broke the news to me, adding, “Thanks so much for all your support and love… we’re truly grateful.” Mauro liked Pink Floyd and Italian movies. La Vita è Bella: His life was rich and full. From the pictures on his wall, it looked like he had really loved his life and had been well loved. Only the other day, he asked me to go and find someone who could lend him a cigarette and then take him out to a spot where he could smoke it.
Mauro wasn’t the only resident to die yesterday; just before lunch I watched as the undertakers took Ronald’s body away. I stood as witness by the door and lowered my head. In between Mauro and Ronald, I spent some time with Gwen who is now palliative. She held my hand so tightly with a grip strength that I daresay even I couldn’t manage these days. I wondered, where did that strength come from? Was she afraid? And was she frightened of dying, or of being alone? I remembered being in Bristol General when I was maybe just a teenager and that sinking feeling when family returned home after a visit.
I don’t think anyone really wants to be alone.
For all my genuine love of solitude, I have been very lonely lately. I don’t know why, when I’ve been so busy with things. But my birthday ushered in a powerful wave of loneliness. I received deliveries of wine and poetry collections, scores of greetings, and cards and gifts in the post from loved ones back home – all things I love! – but all of it only served to underline the tyranny of distance that I’m feeling. Of course, I remedied the situation by booking lunches or dinner and drinks with lots of friends. And now my diary is so full that it makes me nervous even to think about it!
I’m homesick. I’ve been looking at cottages in Somerset again on Right Move. I found four I like: in Draycott, Winford, Banwell and Wrington. I know, I know, it’s reckless, but my heart right now is living in two places. My history stretches across two places. And I know my dreams of the future are as much there as they are here.
My new (to me anyway) car doesn’t have Bluetooth, so I’ve been playing old CDs and reliving the memories that have surged back. My phone has long-since carried my favourite songs, but there is treasure in playing entire albums and hearing those deeper cuts again. The power of music. One day earlier in the week I drove to work listening to a CD of Barbra Streisand’s Greatest Hits. I still think the way Barbra hums the introduction to The way we were must be the best opening to any song. Ever. I kept putting it back to the start all the way into work. I remembered people and places… I did the same with Evergreen all the way home. “Love, soft as an easy chair…” Part stimming, part recapturing something.
I went a bit crazy and bought Thea Gilmore’s seven album retrospective box set. I already own six of the albums digitally, not that the car would know anything about that. The period covered by those seven years is the period of my decision to leave England and emigrate to Australia, of my marriage break-up and temporary return to England, of the turbulent years back in Australia on that dating treadmill just trying not to be alone, of buying that disastrous fixer-upper in the hills that sank in on itself (and has apparently reincarnated as my new car), and the beginning of my time in the Uniting Church. In some ways, those years chewed me up and spat me out. And Thea provided much of the soundtrack to the whole parade.
Listening to Thea again has got me remembering that time. From this vantage point, every mistake is laid bare. Every false move recalled. I can say with David, “I know my wrongdoings, and my sin is constantly before me.” I think of Adam hiding from God in the garden, and, seriously, I wish I could hide from myself looking back through some of that time. The regrets. The roots of this current loneliness. The false hopes. The fits and starts. Sings Thea,
“I’m looking for an old soul, where am I gonna go?
I’m looking for an old soul, does anybody know?
He’s got to be flesh and bone, the sweetest idea of home…”
I’m still hoping for an old soul to match my old soul. And redirect me homewards. At least I think I am.
Last week took some getting through. What with my chest still not recovered from the car accident, the new car being a complete lemon – inconvenience and expense in equal measure, the end of orchid season, last week’s home-computer breakdown, and Loneliness and Sadness arriving as uninvited houseguests, I thought for a moment there that I’d be swept down the river and out to sea.
And yet, there were always branches on the riverbank to prevent me from being lost in the current:
Making a cup of tea in the staff room midweek, a Sikh nurse came up to me smiling and said, “I know you...” I couldn’t think how and returned a puzzled expression. “…From Resthaven in Mount Gambier. Earlier this year. I used to see you talking with the residents.” Then curiously, just this afternoon I bumped into someone from Eldercare in Seaford who said, “everyone would love it if you came back...” Another dear friend who I used to work with at Eurotunnel a long time ago wrote to me and said, “Wol I miss you so much….”
These branches that stopped me from being cast adrift.
It has me thinking about the impact we make and the legacy we leave. I’m thinking of the people I’ve met and who remember me, the friends and family that that I belong to somehow, and who also belong to me, who I miss, and the folks who miss me.
Sings Thea,
“I grew up with magic, free and wild as bindweed.”
I know folks who don’t like the word magic. But I have always loved that lyric from Thea. I imagine myself deep in the English countryside with thick summer hedgerows and folklore and legends and ancient ways. Or maybe on a painted barge moving slowly down some canal. Every day holds its own magic and mystery. Just recently I have been reading 800-year-old stories about St Francis talking to birds, and the birds understanding his message. I love the idea of the birds listening and understanding. This morning, I watched the honeyeaters for a while in the garden. And the blackbird too. I have come to recognise their individual ways. The blackbird watches me while I do the watering and then darts under the silver birch and begins flicking up the mulch. How does he know to do that? Magic, wild, and free.
Earlier this week, there was a brilliant full moon. “Who would have thought that the moon could dazzle and flame like that?” All of Creation is magic and wonder if we choose to see it. Writes Matheson,
“Lift up your eyes, and behold your place in the universe of God!”
Lift up your eyes and behold your place in all of it! Here is mystery: that the God who made everything would know me. More than this, that He would love me. That He would have a place and purpose for me – a part for me to play in the rhythm of it all. That because of His love, He would provide for me as He does the birds in my garden. And that His provision and His care might still be felt during the tough times. Writes Matheson, “There is not in all His Providence a night without a star.” Matheson knew it. How else could he have written, “O love that will not let me go/ O light that followest all my way/ O joy that seekest me through pain?”
I love that God is doing the holding, and following, and seeking. Source of love, light and joy – hold on to me so I don’t get overwhelmed. Show me my place in this world so I can play my part and feel grounded and secure.
Matheson knew it, and actually I know it too. Call it mystery, call it magic, call it what you like, but something stopped me from being entirely lost at sea this week. Was God in the timely words from strangers, affirming me in ministry? Was God in the greetings and reaching out from old friends and colleagues? Was God behind the calm help from an IT expert and friend who sensed that I was at my wits end and who fixed my computer and this website late into the evening? Was God in the melodies and song lyrics on those old CDs? Was God in the remembering as I worked through the memories of those rollercoaster years? And is God in the promise of catching up with friends over the coming days?
I believe that God is in this sense I have that whenever I’m serving as chaplain – that is when I am in my right place in the universe. God’s peace in those pastoral encounters. Holy ground with Mauro and his family. Holy ground with Gwen. Sings Thea,
“There are angels in the intervals and angels in the stars, there are angels in the radiowaves…
And it’s a beautiful day, go and claim your place, ‘cause this is how you find the way”
Angels everywhere. God at work in everything. It’s a beautiful day. I’m claiming my place. One foot in front of the other. One more step on the way towards home.
Olly Ponsonby, November 2025
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Scripture refs. – Ps 51:3, Gen 3:8-10, Ps 139:1-2, Ps 139:16, Jer 1:5, 1 Jn 4:16, Mt 6:26, Phil 4:19.
Digital artwork extract from image © SaintlyCo. https://www.etsy.com/au/listing/1905316299/saint-francis-of-assisi-the-bird?gpla=1&gao=1&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=shopping_au_en_au_-art_and_collectibles-other&utm_custom1=_k_EAIaIQobChMIz9XH8I7kkAMVQqlmAh0u3A-wEAQYASABEgKbrfD_BwE_k_&utm_content=go_15218874648_127942000285_560417401865_pla-2312386470902_c__1905316299enau_561387473&utm_custom2=15218874648&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=15218874648.
Mauro, Ronald and Gwen’s names have all been changed.
“Love, soft as an easy chair” is from “Evergreen”, lyrics by Paul Williams 1976.
“I’m looking for an old soul…” from Old Soul by Thea Gilmore, 2008
“I grew up with magic…” from “Concrete” by Thea Gilmore, 2009
“Who would have thought that the moon…” from “Gilead” by Marilynne Robinson, 2004
“Lift up your eyes…” from “The Burden-Bearers,” from “Leaves for Quiet Hours,” George Matheson, 1905. “There is not a night…” From “God’s Help in Tribulation,” from “Leaves for Quiet Hours,” George Matheson, 1905.
“There are angels in the intervals...” from “Beautiful Day” by Thea Gilmore, 2013.